Halloween

Korea doesn't really celebrate Halloween but at my Hagwon we try to celebrate all western festivals to teach the kids English in a fun context. To be honest i'm not sure that most of the kids rally grasped the concept. However, it would be a shame if I didn't show you what one of my kids turned up wearing, take a look at this.

It's a good opportunity to bring up an aspect of Korean culture that has to be seen to be beleived. Basically, they both despise and worship the west. As a general rule the older someone is the more they hate you. Many Koreans think that I both smell and look disgusting. When I hand out things to my students they flinch or hold their nose. At first I found this a bit upsetting but now I am used to it. If you get on a bus or train, people will get up and move as far away from you as they can. Sometimes, bars or restaurants that are bustling will be 'closed' when you try to sit down.

On the other hand the younger people think you are fantastic. Men stop their cars to wind down their windows and tell me how handsome I am on a regular basis. Koreans, with the exception of their excessively bushy privates, have no body hair. This means they find the hair on my frearms fascinating and it is by no means uncommon for a fully grown adult to start stroking my forearm mid conversation!

Funniest of all is their obession with the English words on clothing. On the whole they don't understand the language so well so they just print stuffon T-Shirts that they must have found on the internet or something. I saw a kid with 'A golden shower' written on the back of his shirt and 'Mark who?' written on the front. It was fantastic. Swear words are frequently to be seen on the clothing of very young children at school, it is a good laugh every time.

I prefer the subtle mistakes. The local sports shop is called 'Athlete's Foot', you can buy Nike's in there for £15 it's awesome. Best so far though is this boutique: